Great British Railway Journeys (2010–…): Season 3, Episode 2 - Darsham to Felixstowe - full transcript
In 1840, one man transformed
travel in Britain.
His name was George Bradshaw,
and his railway guides inspired
the Victorians to take to the tracks.
Stop by SW
he told them where to travel,
what to see and where to stay.
Now, 170 years later,
Pm making a series of journeys across
the length and breadth of the country
to see what of Bradshaw's Britain
remains.
My journey using my Bradshaw's Guide
continues through Suffolk and Essex.
Before the Industrial Revolution,
parts of these countries
were pretty much isolated.
But the coming of the railway
opened them up.
Not only to trade,
but also to that sort
of Victorian tourist
who was educated and interested
in discovering more of English history.
On today's step of the journey,
I'll be coming face-to-face
with a medieval politician...
Oh, my goodness. That is grotesque.
...sharing the Victorians' fascination
with the freakishly stout...
Bags you're on our team.
How many have we got'?
...and journeying overseas on one
of the world's first electric railways.
This is a great thrill.
I used to come here as a child.
I've never been in the cab.
I began this trip on the east coast.
Now Pm travelling south through
the counties of Suffolk and Essex.
In Bradshaw's day,
this area was for the first time being
carved open by the railways,
allowing tourists and speculators
to flood in.
Today's section begins in Sudbury
and takes me south,
through Witham and Chelmsford,
and then branches back to the coast
at Southend-on-Sea.
With the arrival of the railway
from the 1840s onwards,
Water/ans with an interest in history
could swarm on Sudbury.
My Bradshaw's Guide says of Sudbury,
"It was formerly a place of
far greater importance than at present."
But it also says, "St Gregory's Church
was built by Simon de Sudbury,
who was murdered here by Wat Tyler's mob
and buried near a college,
the gate of which still remains."
Now, that murder, by Wat Tyler's mob,
interests me personally very much.
(tannoy) Can {have your attention?
We wit! shortly be arriving to Sudbury,
where this train terminates.
The reason for the murder was politics.
In particular, the imposition of a tax,
whose name may yet be inscribed
on my tombstone.
In Bradshaw's time,
away-days on the train
to investigate rip-roaring yarns
were extremely popular
and big business for the railways.
Pm meeting Canon Gregory John Webb
at the Church of St Gregory's,
to hear the grisly truth
of Simon de Sudburys demise.
- Hello, Greg. Lovely to see you.
- Good to meet you, Michael.
Why was Simon de Sudbury murdered
by Wat Tyler's mob?
At the time,
he was the Archbishop of Canterbury,
but also the Lord Chancellor.
It was not a good time to be
Lord Chancellor.
They needed to raise some money.
Somebody came up
with the wonderful idea of a poll tax.
This is not Margaret Thatcher's
poll tax.
Definitely not Thatcher's poll tax.
She probably didn't learn from history.
But Simon...
Yes, he introduced the poll tax.
- In what year, then?
- That would be 1381.
OK. From what I remember of poll taxes,
people don't like them too much.
No. It was particularly unpopular
with the poor.
So, a chap called Wat Tyler led
what we now know as the Peasants' Revolt
in protest against the poll tax.
According to Bradshaw, then... Erm...
Simon de Sudbury was murdered here
by Wat Tyler's mob.
Not quite right. No.
He was murdered in the Tower of London,
in the White Tower.
He was beheaded by the mob,
breaking into the tower.
His body is buried in Canterbury.
In the cathedral in Canterbury.
He is the Archbishop of Canterbury
and that's very appropriate.
But I have got something interesting
to show you here in the church,
if you'd like to come this way, Michael.
So, this is the vestry.
And this is what I want to show you.
Oh, my goodness. That is grotesque.
You're going to tell me
that is Simon de Sudbury, are you?
That is Simon of Sudbury's head.
This gruesome relic drew
Victorian railway tourists in droves.
And that head was placed on a spike
on London Bridge back in 1381.
The folk of Sudbury rescued it
and brought it back to Sudbury.
The grateful, fond folk of Sudbury
brought it back.
This is a rather unsettling
confrontation.
In the 1990s, I too was responsible
for implementing a piece
of misconceived poll tax legislation
which brought a government
to the brink of catastrophe.
I feel a sympathetic shiver
down my spine
as my eyes engage with poor
Simon de Sudburys empty sockets.
What do we know about the circumstances
of his decapitation?
It was particularly brutal.
This story is it may well have been
seven blows to decapitate him.
I understand if you look
at the back of the skull,
you can still see some of the marks
in the vertebrae,
which would seem to confirm
that that was the case.
Extraordinary that it's survived
so long.
It really is.
A fascinating thing
you might have noticed about the head,
is that there are no teeth.
Mm.
The story is that a verger,
a couple of hundred years ago or so,
decided that it would be
a good idea to sell the teeth.
The story goes on
that he sold hundreds of them.
(laughs)
Poor Simon introduced the poll tax
and lost his head.
As minister of the poll tax,
I very nearly lost mine.
There's a lesson here.
There is. We hope politicians
in the future vi/ill definitely learn it.
The Victorians loved this gory story
and came in their battalions
to see Simon de Sudburty's head.
Before television deadened
our sensibilities,
this sight must have
set the imagination racing.
Another popular haunt for the Victorians
with “Bradshaws” in hand
is my next destination,
the town of Maiden in Essex.
This is Marks Tey,
where I have to change trains.
The railways allowed Victorians
to breathe fresh air,
glimpse the sea, study their past
and improve their education.
Trains also allowed Water/ans to be
thrilled and tit/Hated,
brightening up lives
that otherwise offered
too few opportunities for merriment.
I'm on my way to Witham Station
to go to Maldon,
which my Bradshaw's tells me
"carried on a great coasting
and considerable trade".
But that wasn't the main attraction for
Victorian sensation-seeking sightseers.
(tannoy) This is Witham.
As Bradshaw puts it,
"Here, Mr Bright, the fat man of Maldon,
lived and died."
"Aged only 28 years,
but weighing 44 stone,
and it is stated that seven men
could be buttoned into his waistcoat."
Now, that does make Maldon
worth a visit.
Pm meeting local historian Stephen Nunn
outside Mr Bright's house.
- Stephen, hello.
- Hello. Nice to meet you.
And to meet you.
My Bradshaw's Guide tells me
about the fat man of Maldon.
A Mr Bright. Who was he?
He was a local lad. Edward Bright.
He was born here in Maldon in 1721.
It was obvious from an early age
that he was going to be a big, big lad.
(Michael) He was the previous century
to my Bradshaw's.
(Stephen) He was, yes.
So, the Victorian railway tourist,
following his Bradshaw's Guide,
comes here to find about a man
who died 100 years before.
Edward Bright. Extraordinary.
He was famous.
There were engravings of him.
He was a well-known character.
They came here on the railway.
They came to look at his house.
They had a look at his tomb
in All Saints Church.
He died in his bed in 1750.
The trouble is, they had a problem
trying to get him down from his bedroom
to take him to be buried.
They had to demolish
pan of the staircase and pan of a wall
and then use a block and tackle
and put him on a can
and take him up to All Saints Church.
There's one more twist
in Edward Bright's tale.
Barely a month after his death,
a wager was laid in a local pub
that so big was he,
seven men could squeeze themselves
inside one of his Waistcoats.
Hence, folklore
and my "Bradshaw's" has it,
that seven fine fellows
successfully accommodated themselves
within Edward Bright's ample garment.
Victorian tourists could still view
the waistcoat on their tour.
Sadly, it's disappeared.
But I can still test
the plausibility of the tale.
This is an exact replica
of Edward Bright's waistcoat.
Good Lord.
Shall we put it to the test?
Would anyone like to come in here?
We've got to get
seven people in this waistcoat.
Come on. Let's see if we can
get seven inside. In you pop.
Bags you're on our team.
How many have we got'?
- Seven.
- We've got seven. Let's close it up.
What do you think, Stephen?
- I think we're just about there.
- Just about there.
(applause)
Before /leave Maldon,
there's a piece of railway architecture
I've been told I mustn't miss.
This is Maldon East Station,
where /could have arrived,
had it not been axed
in the Beeching Cuts of the 1960s.
Rather like my beheaded friend,
Simon de Sudbury,
the station has
a cautionary political tale to tell.
This magnificent station
owes a lot to a would-be politician
called David Waddington,
who, anxious to get elected
to Parliament, built the station.
Of course, the workmen were
very likely to vote for him.
It's a great result.
It must have cost a fortune.
I wonder whether it was worth it
in the long term?
David, did no one ever tell you?
All political careers end in tears.
We a shame I cam hop on the train
at Maiden East.
I leave this sadly abandoned station
to return to Witham,
to catch the train a few mites
to Kelvedon,
where Pm spending the night.
For my night's rest,
I've turned as ever to Bradshaw's.
"In the vicinity is Layer Marney,
with the old brick gate,
property of Quentin Dick Esquire."
HI stay overnight at this sumptuous
Tudor tower and manor house,
built in 1520 during the reign
of Henry VIII,
by Henry 1st Lord Marney.
The owner is now Nick Charrington.
- Good to see you.
- Great to see you.
I'm amazed by the house.
It's like a Tudor skyscraper, isn't it?
(Nick) I think it is the tallest
of all the Tudor gate houses.
It's a sort of statement building.
Henry Marney letting everybody know
that he's rich. He's powerful.
This is his...
it reflects him, as it were.
- Come and have a look.
- Thank you.
To help with the upkeep of the house,
Nick hosts all manner of events,
including weddings,
one of which is in full swing.
- Congratulations.
- Thank you.
My name is Michael Portillo.
Well done.
- What a wonderful place to get married.
- It's lovely.
What a day you chose!
We've had a wonderful day.
It's been beautiful.
It's about to go wild with the dancing.
Yes. Yes.
I believe that a Victorian owner
of Layer Marney
was involved in an MP's expenses
scandal, which has a modem ring.
My Bradshaw's tells me that
Quentin Dick lived here. Who was he?
(Nick) He was the MP for Maldon.
His chief claim to fame, really,
is the sheer amount of money he spent
buying his seat.
He was one of the more crooked MPs.
I think he makes today's trouble
look pretty minor.
In the first election, which he lost,
he and the person he was
standing against, between them,
spent over £30,000 on food, drink
and a bit of travel to get everybody in.
He then won two subsequent elections.
Again, £30,000 bought those two for him.
You haven't told me what party he was.
I may be able to guess.
Conservative.
(both laugh)
So, another salutary tale
of a political miscreant
brings me to the end of a wonderful day.
Victorian railway travellers might have
had cause to shake their heads and tut.
But I feel the force of these stories
more personally.
I retire amused, but also chastened,
by what I've learned today.
On a new day, Pm still thinking how
much pleasure Victorian tourists gained
when, for the first time,
they could travel the country,
just for fun.
But a still bigger impact
of a comprehensive railway
was the growth of industry and of towns.
As the concentrations
of population increased,
so too did
the demand for food production.
I'm now on my way to Chelmsford,
which my Bradshaw's tells me has
a population of 5,513,
very precisely.
"The town contains a Shire Hall
and County Room,
with basement for corn exchange
in which it carries on a large trade."
Now, I've often heard
of corn exchanges,
but never thought much about why they
were buying and selling the cereals.
So, to find out more, what better to do
than to visit a flour mill?
Chelmsford's surviving flour mill
was established in 1824,
when windmills and water mills used
the force of nature to grind the grain.
But the Industrial Revolution harnessed
steam power to drive the milling stones.
No longer dependent
on the whims of wind or water,
flour production increased greatly.
Chelmer Mill flourished
and is still producing today.
Hannah Marriage is the latest generation
of the family to join the company.
I love your Victorian building.
I noticed as I came in that it says
you've been in business since 1824.
Yes, that's right.
We've only been on this site since 1899.
- Only.
- Only, yes.
Founded by my great-great-great
grandfather and his brother.
(Michael) Why did you come here?
(Hannah) The land we purchased
was close to the railway.
We could have our own railway siding.
The railway sidings were obviously
to take your product away, I suppose?
Yeah.
Mainly in terms of bringing coal in.
It was a steam-powered mill.
The coal could be transported far more
effectively by rail than by water.
We also had flour going up to London,
by train.
My Bradshaw's mentions
the Corn Exchange in Chelmsford.
- Did your family make use of that?
- Yeah, they did.
My grandfather and his generation used
to go down there on a weekly basis.
It was the place where the farmers
and millers and merchants
would all meet to buy and sell cereals.
It was quite a good place
to have a catch-up
and a chat and chew things over as well.
Although it is a very historic site,
I gather you're also bang up-to-date.
Our mill's unique.
We've got a mix of the old-fashioned...
We've got 100-year-old French burrstones
to make stone-ground wholemeal flour.
We've got high-tech things.
A computer system runs the mill.
We've got really whizzy machinery
sorting the wheat by colour
and all sons of other things.
It's quite an interesting mix.
- You've whet my appetite. May we look?
- Of course. Come this way.
Hannah's taking me
into the workings of the mill.
Pm going to attempt
to make flour as Victorians did,
and then bake myself a loaf.
- What are these wooden cases?
- These house our French burrstones.
We've got a set of five of these
in this room.
- Burrstones.
- Burrstones, yes.
It's from a region in northern France.
The stones are what we use
to mill traditional
stone-ground wholemeal flour.
So this is just like in the Bible.
Two great big stones...
...grinding together.
(Hannah) You can see behind you,
Simon is actually dressing the stones.
When the business was founded,
all the grinding was done
on stones such as these.
Just as in the 19th century,
every couple of months
the worn-down grooves have to be re-cut
by an experienced miller.
With the burrstones now powered
by electricity
rather than Victorian steam,
Pm going to help Hannah to produce
wholemeal flour.
So, the grain is going in the top there,
going down through the stones...
- Where does it come out?
- If you come round here...
- It's warm!
- Yeah. Freshly milled.
Lovely, though.
This is used for bread-making and so on.
Yeah, exactly.
The next stage is we take it
to our baker for him to test it.
Excellent. Take me to your bread maker.
(Hannah) Follow me.
Although the mills had become
mechanised in Bradshaw's day,
bakeries still languished
in the Dark Ages.
Awful places to work,
with long hours and back-breaking toil.
Bread was still kneaded in huge troughs
with hands and feet.
Workers suffered
innumerable lung problems
from inhaling flour particles.
Thankfully, those days are gone.
Baker Kelvin Ellam is going to give me
a crash course in bread-making
in a clean and safe environment.
So, Kelvin, rather ominously,
you've put two bowls out here.
Looks like I'm going to have
to do something. What's the technique?
Now for the messy pan, unfortunately.
Just run your fingers around.
- (Michael) So, this is called kneading?
- (Kelvin) Kneading, yes.
So, the strong-arm stuff comes later,
does it?
It does, yes.
Actually, it's going to come now.
(Michael) Quite pleased with that.
Quite a clean bowl.
(Kelvin) You're really working it now
so that you develop all the glutens.
(laughs)
- Just like that?
- Just like that.
Just like that. And you should put
quite a lot of effort into this.
Give it quite a lot of power.
How do you know when you've done enough'?
It takes about ten minutes.
You would really want to work it
for eight to ten minutes.
- (Michael) I'm enjoying this.
- I thought you might.
(Michael) Doesn't look smooth.
Just stick those bits in there.
No one will notice.
Finally, its time to taste
some hand-made bread at its finest.
Don't they look magnificent?
That's delicious.
It's so homely, isn't it?
I really needed that.
I thoroughly enjoyed
this slice of Victorian life.
But as I leave the mill,
the heavens open.
Just as Pm about to embark on my last
leg of today's journey, to the seaside.
The English summer.
So, I'm on my way to Southend-on-Sea,
which, according to my Bradshaw's,
"has a pier a mile and a quarter long,
which has been laid
for the accommodation of passengers
arriving by steamer."
Well, I remember this pier
from my childhood holidays.
And what Bradshaw's doesn't mention
is that it has a train!
The growth of the seaside resort
began in the railway age,
as it made access cheaper and quicker.
This initially benefited
only the middle classes.
But by the Kate 19th century,
the bigger Victorian resorts
like Southend
catered for the rapidly-expanding
working-class holiday market.
The name of the station
is Southend Victoria.
Which, of course, underlines how
popular this was in Victorian times.
Water coming through the roof a bit?
Absolutely.
Welcome to sunny Southend-on-Sea.
(Michael) It's a lovely station.
Congratulations.
There's a lot of really old Victorian
structure here. It's really nice.
Do you ever have time
to stand and admire it?
Night shift, mostly.
Time to walk around
when it's nice and quiet
and feel all the ghosts.
Southend has been a holiday destination
since the 18th century.
No self-respecting resort
could grow up without a pier.
Amazingly, at nearly
one-and-a-half miles in length,
Southend has the longest pleasure pier
in the world,
complete with its own railway.
Now, this is
a very special moment for me.
I remember the excitement I felt,
travelling on this train
when I was a child.
The rolling stop was different then.
I remember it was green and cream.
For some reason, I remember the noise.
It used to go, da-dum, da-dum, da-dum.
And the excitement of travelling
on the world's longest pier.
My driver today is {an Peel.
- (Michael) Hello.
- Hello, Michael!
- I've come to join you.
- (horn hanks)
This is a great thrill.
I used to come here as a child.
I've never been in the cab.
It just is a very special pier
and a very special railway, isn't it?
It certainly is.
Lots of people come here
to walk along the pier
and to ride along the pier.
There's an obvious reason
why Southend has such a long pier.
At low tide, the deep sea is
over a mile from the beach.
Large boats couldn't disgorge
their hordes of Victorian tourists
and Margate across the estuary
was pulling in the visitors.
Local dignitaries took action,
and by 1848,
a wooden structure of 7,00%?
was already the longest pier in Europe.
By the end of the 19th century,
a new cast-iron pier, essentially the
one we see today, had been constructed.
One of the worlds first
electric railways opened in 1890.
(Michael) This noise I remember.
The "da-da, da-da".
Why does it make that noise?
It's because we're going over rails
that are joined with fishplates.
There's a gap between each one.
On modern trains and railways,
you'll find they're all welded.
That's why you don't get that noise.
Uniquely on here,
we get that "da-da, da-da" all the time.
How long does it take us to do the trip,
normally?
(Ian) About eight to ten minutes.
We're coming up, as you can see now,
to what we call the loop,
which is the passing place.
Southend Pier has, against the odds,
survived arson, electrical fires
and even boats ramming its structure.
(Michael) So many seaside towns have
lost their piers. It's such a shame.
They've been burned down
or they've been abandoned.
This one, I mean, the Big Daddy
of them all, it goes on, doesn't it?
It certainly does. People love it.
People love to walk up and down here.
The Victorians were going
to the end of the pier
to get their steamers.
To go on their pleasure cruises.
Even those who couldn't afford it,
they would be walking out here.
They would have had
the sensation of being at sea,
even if they couldn't afford
to go to sea.
We used to come as day-trippers as kids.
Of course, if you got the tide wrong,
you had to walk... well, you know...
...getting on for a mile
just to get a bathe in the sea.
Yeah, yeah.
Today, we've had two boats in
that have taken day-trippers off.
- Have you?
- Yes, yes.
I didn't know you still have boats.
This pier is charming, even in the rain.
I mean, look at the lovely reflections.
Look at the light.
I'm going to take a wander.
The Victorians loved
to promenade on piers.
You can imagine,
even on a damp day like today,
people parading,
wanting to see and to be seen,
dressed in their finest.
In a fairground setting
of Punch and Judy shows,
whelk stands and ice-cream carts,
jostling for trade,
it must have been a glorious sight.
Coming to Southend
has made me nostalgic.
Not only for my own childhood,
but also for Bradshaws times.
The Victorians invented the seaside
holiday and bequeathed it to us.
Another pan of their legacy
is this magnificent pier.
When {continue my journey,
HI be finding out how dairy herds
travelled the length and breadth
of Britain first class...
The cow also decided to urinate on me.
But that's alright.
...discovering the secret location
that armed Britain's empire building...
That is the sound of black powder
in the 19th century.
- Brilliant.
- From the Crimea to the Indian Mutiny.
...and hearing of a heinous crime
that shook Victorians' faith
in railway travel.
What they discovered on Hackney Station
was an empty first-class carriage,
absolutely besmeared with blood.
travel in Britain.
His name was George Bradshaw,
and his railway guides inspired
the Victorians to take to the tracks.
Stop by SW
he told them where to travel,
what to see and where to stay.
Now, 170 years later,
Pm making a series of journeys across
the length and breadth of the country
to see what of Bradshaw's Britain
remains.
My journey using my Bradshaw's Guide
continues through Suffolk and Essex.
Before the Industrial Revolution,
parts of these countries
were pretty much isolated.
But the coming of the railway
opened them up.
Not only to trade,
but also to that sort
of Victorian tourist
who was educated and interested
in discovering more of English history.
On today's step of the journey,
I'll be coming face-to-face
with a medieval politician...
Oh, my goodness. That is grotesque.
...sharing the Victorians' fascination
with the freakishly stout...
Bags you're on our team.
How many have we got'?
...and journeying overseas on one
of the world's first electric railways.
This is a great thrill.
I used to come here as a child.
I've never been in the cab.
I began this trip on the east coast.
Now Pm travelling south through
the counties of Suffolk and Essex.
In Bradshaw's day,
this area was for the first time being
carved open by the railways,
allowing tourists and speculators
to flood in.
Today's section begins in Sudbury
and takes me south,
through Witham and Chelmsford,
and then branches back to the coast
at Southend-on-Sea.
With the arrival of the railway
from the 1840s onwards,
Water/ans with an interest in history
could swarm on Sudbury.
My Bradshaw's Guide says of Sudbury,
"It was formerly a place of
far greater importance than at present."
But it also says, "St Gregory's Church
was built by Simon de Sudbury,
who was murdered here by Wat Tyler's mob
and buried near a college,
the gate of which still remains."
Now, that murder, by Wat Tyler's mob,
interests me personally very much.
(tannoy) Can {have your attention?
We wit! shortly be arriving to Sudbury,
where this train terminates.
The reason for the murder was politics.
In particular, the imposition of a tax,
whose name may yet be inscribed
on my tombstone.
In Bradshaw's time,
away-days on the train
to investigate rip-roaring yarns
were extremely popular
and big business for the railways.
Pm meeting Canon Gregory John Webb
at the Church of St Gregory's,
to hear the grisly truth
of Simon de Sudburys demise.
- Hello, Greg. Lovely to see you.
- Good to meet you, Michael.
Why was Simon de Sudbury murdered
by Wat Tyler's mob?
At the time,
he was the Archbishop of Canterbury,
but also the Lord Chancellor.
It was not a good time to be
Lord Chancellor.
They needed to raise some money.
Somebody came up
with the wonderful idea of a poll tax.
This is not Margaret Thatcher's
poll tax.
Definitely not Thatcher's poll tax.
She probably didn't learn from history.
But Simon...
Yes, he introduced the poll tax.
- In what year, then?
- That would be 1381.
OK. From what I remember of poll taxes,
people don't like them too much.
No. It was particularly unpopular
with the poor.
So, a chap called Wat Tyler led
what we now know as the Peasants' Revolt
in protest against the poll tax.
According to Bradshaw, then... Erm...
Simon de Sudbury was murdered here
by Wat Tyler's mob.
Not quite right. No.
He was murdered in the Tower of London,
in the White Tower.
He was beheaded by the mob,
breaking into the tower.
His body is buried in Canterbury.
In the cathedral in Canterbury.
He is the Archbishop of Canterbury
and that's very appropriate.
But I have got something interesting
to show you here in the church,
if you'd like to come this way, Michael.
So, this is the vestry.
And this is what I want to show you.
Oh, my goodness. That is grotesque.
You're going to tell me
that is Simon de Sudbury, are you?
That is Simon of Sudbury's head.
This gruesome relic drew
Victorian railway tourists in droves.
And that head was placed on a spike
on London Bridge back in 1381.
The folk of Sudbury rescued it
and brought it back to Sudbury.
The grateful, fond folk of Sudbury
brought it back.
This is a rather unsettling
confrontation.
In the 1990s, I too was responsible
for implementing a piece
of misconceived poll tax legislation
which brought a government
to the brink of catastrophe.
I feel a sympathetic shiver
down my spine
as my eyes engage with poor
Simon de Sudburys empty sockets.
What do we know about the circumstances
of his decapitation?
It was particularly brutal.
This story is it may well have been
seven blows to decapitate him.
I understand if you look
at the back of the skull,
you can still see some of the marks
in the vertebrae,
which would seem to confirm
that that was the case.
Extraordinary that it's survived
so long.
It really is.
A fascinating thing
you might have noticed about the head,
is that there are no teeth.
Mm.
The story is that a verger,
a couple of hundred years ago or so,
decided that it would be
a good idea to sell the teeth.
The story goes on
that he sold hundreds of them.
(laughs)
Poor Simon introduced the poll tax
and lost his head.
As minister of the poll tax,
I very nearly lost mine.
There's a lesson here.
There is. We hope politicians
in the future vi/ill definitely learn it.
The Victorians loved this gory story
and came in their battalions
to see Simon de Sudburty's head.
Before television deadened
our sensibilities,
this sight must have
set the imagination racing.
Another popular haunt for the Victorians
with “Bradshaws” in hand
is my next destination,
the town of Maiden in Essex.
This is Marks Tey,
where I have to change trains.
The railways allowed Victorians
to breathe fresh air,
glimpse the sea, study their past
and improve their education.
Trains also allowed Water/ans to be
thrilled and tit/Hated,
brightening up lives
that otherwise offered
too few opportunities for merriment.
I'm on my way to Witham Station
to go to Maldon,
which my Bradshaw's tells me
"carried on a great coasting
and considerable trade".
But that wasn't the main attraction for
Victorian sensation-seeking sightseers.
(tannoy) This is Witham.
As Bradshaw puts it,
"Here, Mr Bright, the fat man of Maldon,
lived and died."
"Aged only 28 years,
but weighing 44 stone,
and it is stated that seven men
could be buttoned into his waistcoat."
Now, that does make Maldon
worth a visit.
Pm meeting local historian Stephen Nunn
outside Mr Bright's house.
- Stephen, hello.
- Hello. Nice to meet you.
And to meet you.
My Bradshaw's Guide tells me
about the fat man of Maldon.
A Mr Bright. Who was he?
He was a local lad. Edward Bright.
He was born here in Maldon in 1721.
It was obvious from an early age
that he was going to be a big, big lad.
(Michael) He was the previous century
to my Bradshaw's.
(Stephen) He was, yes.
So, the Victorian railway tourist,
following his Bradshaw's Guide,
comes here to find about a man
who died 100 years before.
Edward Bright. Extraordinary.
He was famous.
There were engravings of him.
He was a well-known character.
They came here on the railway.
They came to look at his house.
They had a look at his tomb
in All Saints Church.
He died in his bed in 1750.
The trouble is, they had a problem
trying to get him down from his bedroom
to take him to be buried.
They had to demolish
pan of the staircase and pan of a wall
and then use a block and tackle
and put him on a can
and take him up to All Saints Church.
There's one more twist
in Edward Bright's tale.
Barely a month after his death,
a wager was laid in a local pub
that so big was he,
seven men could squeeze themselves
inside one of his Waistcoats.
Hence, folklore
and my "Bradshaw's" has it,
that seven fine fellows
successfully accommodated themselves
within Edward Bright's ample garment.
Victorian tourists could still view
the waistcoat on their tour.
Sadly, it's disappeared.
But I can still test
the plausibility of the tale.
This is an exact replica
of Edward Bright's waistcoat.
Good Lord.
Shall we put it to the test?
Would anyone like to come in here?
We've got to get
seven people in this waistcoat.
Come on. Let's see if we can
get seven inside. In you pop.
Bags you're on our team.
How many have we got'?
- Seven.
- We've got seven. Let's close it up.
What do you think, Stephen?
- I think we're just about there.
- Just about there.
(applause)
Before /leave Maldon,
there's a piece of railway architecture
I've been told I mustn't miss.
This is Maldon East Station,
where /could have arrived,
had it not been axed
in the Beeching Cuts of the 1960s.
Rather like my beheaded friend,
Simon de Sudbury,
the station has
a cautionary political tale to tell.
This magnificent station
owes a lot to a would-be politician
called David Waddington,
who, anxious to get elected
to Parliament, built the station.
Of course, the workmen were
very likely to vote for him.
It's a great result.
It must have cost a fortune.
I wonder whether it was worth it
in the long term?
David, did no one ever tell you?
All political careers end in tears.
We a shame I cam hop on the train
at Maiden East.
I leave this sadly abandoned station
to return to Witham,
to catch the train a few mites
to Kelvedon,
where Pm spending the night.
For my night's rest,
I've turned as ever to Bradshaw's.
"In the vicinity is Layer Marney,
with the old brick gate,
property of Quentin Dick Esquire."
HI stay overnight at this sumptuous
Tudor tower and manor house,
built in 1520 during the reign
of Henry VIII,
by Henry 1st Lord Marney.
The owner is now Nick Charrington.
- Good to see you.
- Great to see you.
I'm amazed by the house.
It's like a Tudor skyscraper, isn't it?
(Nick) I think it is the tallest
of all the Tudor gate houses.
It's a sort of statement building.
Henry Marney letting everybody know
that he's rich. He's powerful.
This is his...
it reflects him, as it were.
- Come and have a look.
- Thank you.
To help with the upkeep of the house,
Nick hosts all manner of events,
including weddings,
one of which is in full swing.
- Congratulations.
- Thank you.
My name is Michael Portillo.
Well done.
- What a wonderful place to get married.
- It's lovely.
What a day you chose!
We've had a wonderful day.
It's been beautiful.
It's about to go wild with the dancing.
Yes. Yes.
I believe that a Victorian owner
of Layer Marney
was involved in an MP's expenses
scandal, which has a modem ring.
My Bradshaw's tells me that
Quentin Dick lived here. Who was he?
(Nick) He was the MP for Maldon.
His chief claim to fame, really,
is the sheer amount of money he spent
buying his seat.
He was one of the more crooked MPs.
I think he makes today's trouble
look pretty minor.
In the first election, which he lost,
he and the person he was
standing against, between them,
spent over £30,000 on food, drink
and a bit of travel to get everybody in.
He then won two subsequent elections.
Again, £30,000 bought those two for him.
You haven't told me what party he was.
I may be able to guess.
Conservative.
(both laugh)
So, another salutary tale
of a political miscreant
brings me to the end of a wonderful day.
Victorian railway travellers might have
had cause to shake their heads and tut.
But I feel the force of these stories
more personally.
I retire amused, but also chastened,
by what I've learned today.
On a new day, Pm still thinking how
much pleasure Victorian tourists gained
when, for the first time,
they could travel the country,
just for fun.
But a still bigger impact
of a comprehensive railway
was the growth of industry and of towns.
As the concentrations
of population increased,
so too did
the demand for food production.
I'm now on my way to Chelmsford,
which my Bradshaw's tells me has
a population of 5,513,
very precisely.
"The town contains a Shire Hall
and County Room,
with basement for corn exchange
in which it carries on a large trade."
Now, I've often heard
of corn exchanges,
but never thought much about why they
were buying and selling the cereals.
So, to find out more, what better to do
than to visit a flour mill?
Chelmsford's surviving flour mill
was established in 1824,
when windmills and water mills used
the force of nature to grind the grain.
But the Industrial Revolution harnessed
steam power to drive the milling stones.
No longer dependent
on the whims of wind or water,
flour production increased greatly.
Chelmer Mill flourished
and is still producing today.
Hannah Marriage is the latest generation
of the family to join the company.
I love your Victorian building.
I noticed as I came in that it says
you've been in business since 1824.
Yes, that's right.
We've only been on this site since 1899.
- Only.
- Only, yes.
Founded by my great-great-great
grandfather and his brother.
(Michael) Why did you come here?
(Hannah) The land we purchased
was close to the railway.
We could have our own railway siding.
The railway sidings were obviously
to take your product away, I suppose?
Yeah.
Mainly in terms of bringing coal in.
It was a steam-powered mill.
The coal could be transported far more
effectively by rail than by water.
We also had flour going up to London,
by train.
My Bradshaw's mentions
the Corn Exchange in Chelmsford.
- Did your family make use of that?
- Yeah, they did.
My grandfather and his generation used
to go down there on a weekly basis.
It was the place where the farmers
and millers and merchants
would all meet to buy and sell cereals.
It was quite a good place
to have a catch-up
and a chat and chew things over as well.
Although it is a very historic site,
I gather you're also bang up-to-date.
Our mill's unique.
We've got a mix of the old-fashioned...
We've got 100-year-old French burrstones
to make stone-ground wholemeal flour.
We've got high-tech things.
A computer system runs the mill.
We've got really whizzy machinery
sorting the wheat by colour
and all sons of other things.
It's quite an interesting mix.
- You've whet my appetite. May we look?
- Of course. Come this way.
Hannah's taking me
into the workings of the mill.
Pm going to attempt
to make flour as Victorians did,
and then bake myself a loaf.
- What are these wooden cases?
- These house our French burrstones.
We've got a set of five of these
in this room.
- Burrstones.
- Burrstones, yes.
It's from a region in northern France.
The stones are what we use
to mill traditional
stone-ground wholemeal flour.
So this is just like in the Bible.
Two great big stones...
...grinding together.
(Hannah) You can see behind you,
Simon is actually dressing the stones.
When the business was founded,
all the grinding was done
on stones such as these.
Just as in the 19th century,
every couple of months
the worn-down grooves have to be re-cut
by an experienced miller.
With the burrstones now powered
by electricity
rather than Victorian steam,
Pm going to help Hannah to produce
wholemeal flour.
So, the grain is going in the top there,
going down through the stones...
- Where does it come out?
- If you come round here...
- It's warm!
- Yeah. Freshly milled.
Lovely, though.
This is used for bread-making and so on.
Yeah, exactly.
The next stage is we take it
to our baker for him to test it.
Excellent. Take me to your bread maker.
(Hannah) Follow me.
Although the mills had become
mechanised in Bradshaw's day,
bakeries still languished
in the Dark Ages.
Awful places to work,
with long hours and back-breaking toil.
Bread was still kneaded in huge troughs
with hands and feet.
Workers suffered
innumerable lung problems
from inhaling flour particles.
Thankfully, those days are gone.
Baker Kelvin Ellam is going to give me
a crash course in bread-making
in a clean and safe environment.
So, Kelvin, rather ominously,
you've put two bowls out here.
Looks like I'm going to have
to do something. What's the technique?
Now for the messy pan, unfortunately.
Just run your fingers around.
- (Michael) So, this is called kneading?
- (Kelvin) Kneading, yes.
So, the strong-arm stuff comes later,
does it?
It does, yes.
Actually, it's going to come now.
(Michael) Quite pleased with that.
Quite a clean bowl.
(Kelvin) You're really working it now
so that you develop all the glutens.
(laughs)
- Just like that?
- Just like that.
Just like that. And you should put
quite a lot of effort into this.
Give it quite a lot of power.
How do you know when you've done enough'?
It takes about ten minutes.
You would really want to work it
for eight to ten minutes.
- (Michael) I'm enjoying this.
- I thought you might.
(Michael) Doesn't look smooth.
Just stick those bits in there.
No one will notice.
Finally, its time to taste
some hand-made bread at its finest.
Don't they look magnificent?
That's delicious.
It's so homely, isn't it?
I really needed that.
I thoroughly enjoyed
this slice of Victorian life.
But as I leave the mill,
the heavens open.
Just as Pm about to embark on my last
leg of today's journey, to the seaside.
The English summer.
So, I'm on my way to Southend-on-Sea,
which, according to my Bradshaw's,
"has a pier a mile and a quarter long,
which has been laid
for the accommodation of passengers
arriving by steamer."
Well, I remember this pier
from my childhood holidays.
And what Bradshaw's doesn't mention
is that it has a train!
The growth of the seaside resort
began in the railway age,
as it made access cheaper and quicker.
This initially benefited
only the middle classes.
But by the Kate 19th century,
the bigger Victorian resorts
like Southend
catered for the rapidly-expanding
working-class holiday market.
The name of the station
is Southend Victoria.
Which, of course, underlines how
popular this was in Victorian times.
Water coming through the roof a bit?
Absolutely.
Welcome to sunny Southend-on-Sea.
(Michael) It's a lovely station.
Congratulations.
There's a lot of really old Victorian
structure here. It's really nice.
Do you ever have time
to stand and admire it?
Night shift, mostly.
Time to walk around
when it's nice and quiet
and feel all the ghosts.
Southend has been a holiday destination
since the 18th century.
No self-respecting resort
could grow up without a pier.
Amazingly, at nearly
one-and-a-half miles in length,
Southend has the longest pleasure pier
in the world,
complete with its own railway.
Now, this is
a very special moment for me.
I remember the excitement I felt,
travelling on this train
when I was a child.
The rolling stop was different then.
I remember it was green and cream.
For some reason, I remember the noise.
It used to go, da-dum, da-dum, da-dum.
And the excitement of travelling
on the world's longest pier.
My driver today is {an Peel.
- (Michael) Hello.
- Hello, Michael!
- I've come to join you.
- (horn hanks)
This is a great thrill.
I used to come here as a child.
I've never been in the cab.
It just is a very special pier
and a very special railway, isn't it?
It certainly is.
Lots of people come here
to walk along the pier
and to ride along the pier.
There's an obvious reason
why Southend has such a long pier.
At low tide, the deep sea is
over a mile from the beach.
Large boats couldn't disgorge
their hordes of Victorian tourists
and Margate across the estuary
was pulling in the visitors.
Local dignitaries took action,
and by 1848,
a wooden structure of 7,00%?
was already the longest pier in Europe.
By the end of the 19th century,
a new cast-iron pier, essentially the
one we see today, had been constructed.
One of the worlds first
electric railways opened in 1890.
(Michael) This noise I remember.
The "da-da, da-da".
Why does it make that noise?
It's because we're going over rails
that are joined with fishplates.
There's a gap between each one.
On modern trains and railways,
you'll find they're all welded.
That's why you don't get that noise.
Uniquely on here,
we get that "da-da, da-da" all the time.
How long does it take us to do the trip,
normally?
(Ian) About eight to ten minutes.
We're coming up, as you can see now,
to what we call the loop,
which is the passing place.
Southend Pier has, against the odds,
survived arson, electrical fires
and even boats ramming its structure.
(Michael) So many seaside towns have
lost their piers. It's such a shame.
They've been burned down
or they've been abandoned.
This one, I mean, the Big Daddy
of them all, it goes on, doesn't it?
It certainly does. People love it.
People love to walk up and down here.
The Victorians were going
to the end of the pier
to get their steamers.
To go on their pleasure cruises.
Even those who couldn't afford it,
they would be walking out here.
They would have had
the sensation of being at sea,
even if they couldn't afford
to go to sea.
We used to come as day-trippers as kids.
Of course, if you got the tide wrong,
you had to walk... well, you know...
...getting on for a mile
just to get a bathe in the sea.
Yeah, yeah.
Today, we've had two boats in
that have taken day-trippers off.
- Have you?
- Yes, yes.
I didn't know you still have boats.
This pier is charming, even in the rain.
I mean, look at the lovely reflections.
Look at the light.
I'm going to take a wander.
The Victorians loved
to promenade on piers.
You can imagine,
even on a damp day like today,
people parading,
wanting to see and to be seen,
dressed in their finest.
In a fairground setting
of Punch and Judy shows,
whelk stands and ice-cream carts,
jostling for trade,
it must have been a glorious sight.
Coming to Southend
has made me nostalgic.
Not only for my own childhood,
but also for Bradshaws times.
The Victorians invented the seaside
holiday and bequeathed it to us.
Another pan of their legacy
is this magnificent pier.
When {continue my journey,
HI be finding out how dairy herds
travelled the length and breadth
of Britain first class...
The cow also decided to urinate on me.
But that's alright.
...discovering the secret location
that armed Britain's empire building...
That is the sound of black powder
in the 19th century.
- Brilliant.
- From the Crimea to the Indian Mutiny.
...and hearing of a heinous crime
that shook Victorians' faith
in railway travel.
What they discovered on Hackney Station
was an empty first-class carriage,
absolutely besmeared with blood.